The concept of "insurance" is that you have to pay into it in order to take advantage of it. It doesn't work this way but somehow some genius in Congress wrote in a condition that the FDIC will have to cover up to $250,000 in failed bank deposits going back to January 1, 2008.

I'll also take what's behind Door #2, Alex, no end to the $250,000 in insurance!

Again, I don't have to defend the fact that I still care about failed banks.

Anyway, I present more Frankendodd awesomeness for your reading pleasure via the FDIC (who suspiciously stopped sending me emails three or four weeks ago... that's the 3rd time I've magically disappeared from their mailing list. Shhh...):

The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act signed into law by President Barack Obama today permanently raised the maximum deposit insurance amount to $250,000. In addition, the Act made this increase retroactive to January 1, 2008.

The provision making the law retroactive means that the $250,000 deposit insurance amount applies to banks that failed between January 1 and October 3, 2008. These insured institutions are: